Chelsea 1-2 Palace: What have Blues done for the first time since December 2006?

Jose Mourinho has got some more thinking to do. In his 100th home game in charge of Chelsea, the Portuguese prince suffered only his second defeat to leave the Blues a worrying eight points off leaders Manchester City after just four games.

By losing to Alan Pardew's excellent Crystal Palace, Chelsea sit behind only Blackburn (1995/96) for the worst start of a Premier League season as reigning champions after four matches.

Here it looked like they'd at least snatched a point when substitute Radamel Falcao cancelled out Bakary Sako's second-half strike, only for Palace full-back Joel Ward to storm up the other end inside two minutes and consign Jose & Co. to another miserable afternoon.

After the match, Mourinho claimed he blamed himself for allowing one of his players to play the full 90 minutes... but would not reveal who. "The result should be a draw, which would still be bad for us," the Chelsea chief also stated. "My two centre-backs and keeper played a very good game. We created lots of chances but we had a couple of players who were not in the game. When the team is not consistent and there aren’t 10 players on the pitch at a certain level it’s difficult."